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Christmas is the one time of the year that agencies wholeheartedly give themselves over to flagrant self promotion. The infamous ‘agency card’ is no longer a card per se, but anything whatsoever, as long as it gets a few eyeballs and acts as a vehicle to show off your agency’s creativity. But who’s winning the battle of the cards in 2014? It’s the Adland UK ‘Ho Ho Ho’ Awards.

While the hipsters at my agency all have the youtube yule logs on in the background, Longhorn and Rokkan have done them one better by launching the world's first Yule Steak. Could you imagine really keeping a steak on that long? Yikes. It'd be charcoal by the time it was done. Either way sit back and get into the holiday spirit with the link below. Strangely enough I'm now hungry. Gotta go to lunch.

To promote Jerusalem-based non-profit Comedy For Change Tel-Aviv-based digital agency Hooligans, created Go Hora! It basically takes music videos on Youtube and mixes it with random Jews doing traditional dances. Surprisingly, the beats of songs like Nicki Minaj's "Anaconda" sync up to the other dances.
It's kind of like Dark Side Of The Moon syncing up to The Wizard of Oz, except there are no munchkins and its more Jewish.

Think technology zaps all the fun and imagination out of young lumps of clay? Good news-- SantApp is here to bring some Christmas magic to your kids' lives. Spanish agency Shackelton has created SantApp, a sort of interactive Holiday emulator if you would. Using standard mobile phone technology, SantApp creates the illusion that Father Christmas or the Three Kings are moving around in your living room, and dropping off their Christmas presents.

Oblique Strategies : In 1975, Peter Schmidt and Brian Eno created a creativity kickstart pack of strategy cards. They are the original brainstorming cards with phrases like "small clouds obscure the sun", "disconnect from desire" and "faced with a choice, do both". Over 100 worthwhile dilemmas are hidden in this pack that help snap you out of a creative rut. In its fifth edition now, it's a creative classic.

BETC, just released General Graffiti, a book celebrating 40 years of street art in Paris. The book was written by street artist Karim Boukercha with photographs like the ones above by Yves Marchand and Romain Meffre. The book is coming out via publisher Dominique Carré, One of the highlights is the Magasins Généraux building in Pantin. Not only does it have a history of being a street artist hang out but in 2016 BETC plans to move there.

Fun idea. Dutch band Allstars fooled Shazam into thinking they were Avicii, Rihanna and other bands. Not only does it give them more exposure than it would if they'd been another ignored band on Spotify, but they also Shazam look stupid by not being able to tell the difference. Win wn. Go to The World's Best Cover Band and see for yourself. You might just end up booking them at your next party!